Day 6: January Mindful Writing Challenge

We’re on the sixth day of the January Mindful Writing Challenge – please post your small stone in the comments below. If you’re not already signed up, our 31 Days of Waking Up daily email package was designed to accompany you during this (or any) month of mindful writing. Keep writing!

After the storm, the sky is the colour of marmalade.
The sun has split open, staining the clouds.
Flying foxes awake from their slumber and their graceful black shapes begin to punctuate the thick evening light.

I CAN see clearly now
I have been looking at the world the wrong way round.
Death isn’t a full stop;
An annihilation or
A crash into oblivion.
It’s part of life’s rich tapestry;
A stepping stone,
A celebration,
The promise of Spring.
It’s the melting of Jack Frost’s callous icicles,
That have held my life
in suspended animation

Day 6 Gratitude
Sitting at my desk I pick up the pen and draw a line
then another.
I draw a curve, it meets the line
it creates a shape.
I draw more lines and curves
a shape appears as if it has been waiting
to see the light.
Lines, shapes, dots, words merging
together to become…………..

Years of clothes hanging echoes many whips and snaps in my memory chambers. As a child I used to watch the chaioscurro on the grass as I played beneath the thrashing clothes. It was as if another kingdom was founded and I searched the blades of grass for little people…

Grateful on this far-too-early morning, for the breath of the one who lays beside me; the grace from the One who made me; the joy of being a mother, wife, sister, daughter, friend; and the work that is before me as a human on this planet. And coffee. Grateful always for the coffee!

I am grateful for my embodied life this day,
In a body which still functions well
In spite of wear and tear of age.
Wrinkles, age spots, greying hair,
Aching joints, temperamental gut.
Thank you, friend, for years of service
Including times of pain.
Help me to hear your messages to me
With attention and gratitude
While our journey together continues.

Winter Morning Sky: The sky in this moment is so beautiful. Behind the bare gray branches of my lilacs and over my neighbors’ roofs which are covered in snow is the sweetest thread of golden pink under a clear cold sky of pale blue. I try to take a picture so you can see it too, but none of them capture it. (the best picture I could get, http://thousandshadesofgray.com/2014/01/06/smallstone-winter-morning-sky/)

With gratitude, my kneeling meditation bench:
You have supported my inward travel since I began and you, like I, are no worse for the wear, but rather, in truth, improved through the timelessness of our journey to here and now.

Extreme example of light/shadow, Yin/Yang , the opposite forces of the Universe. Life/death. Upon learning with sorrow of someone’s passing, then being filled with joy for the release from suffering. Regret and gratitude intertwine to make me human.

Polar vortex. No hanging clothes on the line. No little people living in the grass, Just snow cemeteries. From the frosted window swaying branches cannot be heard over the furnace’s plowing dry breathe. Vortex out and in. Breathe.

Even the edges of my thick jumper are wet, a pair of slugs sliding trails of moisture down to my elbows each time I raise the tepid coffee to my lips. A puddle of beige collects in the white saucer, settles to the lowest layer. The cold settles in around my thighs, wet trousers rubbing against wet skin. Outside, the rain has stopped, of course, blue skies veiled by gossamer thin grey froth. Sunlight captured in the tears wept by the building; falling stars illuminated above cultured evergreens.

My heartbeat, first fast and uncomfortable,
is now slowing down.
My anxiety, first big and unbearable,
is now almost gone.
My relief, first impossible to find,
is now instantly present
and so is my happiness.
Welcome home, Snoezy-cat!

Tonight I saw the moon like never before…
It was crescent shaped…
Yet it pointed neither left nor right, but upwards…
Like a huge smile gleaming in the pitch-black cloudless sky…
Its color resembling silken Cornish clotted cream…

Casting about desperately for a subject, looking inside and out, knowing that this is NOT the process, is NOT the method, is NOT the way, when without plan, my nose is alerted…

and suddenly, I am captured by the aroma, a distinct whiff of wet dog, and then see glistening pawprints on the hardwood, brown eyes beseeching, and hear dog nails ticking along the floor. This is mindfulness, this content being my actual life, and there being no need to seek anywhere but here.

“You do realize,” she said, “as of this birthday, you’ve officially been married longer than you were ever single?”
His brow wrinkled as he did the math. “OH!”
“Yep! You’ve been married over half your life!”
He beamed at his bride.

Good news, the first good news in months, it seems, good news, and his voice on the telephone is no longer thick with burden, and even the furnace kicked on this morning, even the furnace was kind, saying, “OK, kid, I’ll lob you a free one, here’s a beautiful surprise. Drink your coffee in peace. Stare at the window, sip, and be grateful you’re on this side of the glass.”

I apologize if I’m double-posting…I’m playing catch-up and cannot seem to find where I left off…

January 6, 2014

ABOUT TO UNDERGO A SEA-CHANGE REDUX

You, at two, are about to become—not only
a big brother, but also a middle child. In one
cataclysmic day, you will no longer be the baby
of the family, you’ll no longer have your own room,
nor sleep in a crib. You and your big brother will
begin sharing a room. Let’s hope we remember
to make this time as special for you and your big
brother as possible.

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